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Archive for the ‘DM Data 101’ Category

18 Month NCOA and how to get it

January 21st, 2009

The 18 month NCOA Link processing provides National Change of Address processing for the last 18 months.  This process will not correct those people who have relocated from 18 to 48 months ago.  This processing was designed to satisfy the most common file updating.  The processing is perfect for files that have already been NCOA’d within the last 18 months, or if the database you’re going to mail has been purchase within the last year and you are planning to mail again.

USPS New Move Compliance
To satisfy the United States Post Office requirements when mailing Standard Rate, you will need to be sure that all files used are new move compliant.  The requirement is that your mailing list has been NCOA’d within 95 days of mailing.

B-Clean Lite data hygiene
The B-Clean Lite process is offered by BB Direct and provides a combination of both the 18 month NCOA and ANK Link Processing.  The ANK Link Processing flags those records where a move had occurred but did so between 18 and 48 months ago.  It also provides the date of the move but does not correct the address itself.  The B-Clean Lite product from BB Direct is perfect for all files in that it is a cost effective way to correct those recent moves and flag those older moves at a low cost.  You can then decide what to do with the older flagged addresses, i.e., delete them, add “Or current resident” to the address, or gather these records together and process with the 48 Month NCOA Link processing. BB Direct also offers an unlimited access FTP site folder for the B-Clean Lite folder.  This folder is password protected and available 24/7 to make NCOA correction available any hour of the day.  The system is cost effective and simple to use.

If you would like to learn more about BB Direct’s data hygiene product line click here, or visit our website or other fine mailing list products.

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Generating Buyers, Not Leads

January 8th, 2009

When working with your mailing list broker to build your target mailing list criteria there are a number of key points to keep in mind.  Below are a number of simple but important points to do to remember that may make the difference between generating buyers, not leads.  A few simple adjustments can improve your direct mail targeting, response results, and your bottom line. I urge you to consider these 6 absolutes before purchasing any mailing list.

1.  One per household vs. one per address

Traditionally, counts and orders have included duplicate records for the same mailing address.  Your mailing list will most likely default to “One Per Household.”  This means that for every home where there are at least two roommates sharing the same mailing address, but not the same last name, or where there is a married couple not sharing the same name, there will be two records made available to you.  Thus, two mail pieces will be delivered to that same mail box.  This may or may not be appropriate for your campaign.  A cellular phone coupon offer that might include a new phone with a 24 month activation and service commitment would be ideal for multiple mail pieces arriving in the same mail box the same day for different people.  However, an offer announcing the grand opening of a new summer camp for your child would not.
To correct this default, be sure you request your original count and order to “One Per Address”, instead of “One Per Household.”  This will likely reduce your total mail file by up to 10 percent and significantly increase your return on investment.

2.  Consider capping your filter ranges for a tighter, more accurate target audience

For many campaigns, the mailing list criteria set may include demographic filters such as age and income.  For example, your target audience could be all households with an estimated household income range of $40,000 +, or an age range of age 45 +.  Depending on your offer, those highest income and age ranges might not be any better than those ranges below your starting point.  Ask yourself if your ideal customer is one with an income greater than $125,000 income or one with an age of 75 or 85 years or higher.  If not, then stop your age and income at the top range and eliminate unwanted mail waste.  Remember, the goal is not to mail more but to mail more accurately.  Reducing any “non-responders” will only improve your response rate and overall bottom line return on investment.

Other selects to consider are Home Value/Assessed Value, Length of Residence, Home Year Built, Mortgage Loan Amount, etc.  You may also want to consider mailing more than one mail piece version to various ranges that reach a type of potential buyer.
Likewise, you could version your mail piece creative and offer to gain lift in response.  As an example, rather than eliminating the senior population from your campaign, mail a different version of your mail piece that’s more appealing to this older age bracket.  This mail versioning is also helpful when focusing on more affluent households.  Some offers including discounted services designed for the budget conscience, while those more affluent households are generally looking for quality over price.

3.  Properly set response and deliverability expectations

It is important to understand that no mailing list is perfect.  Therefore you should expect that there will be some degree of inaccurate mailing list records and undeliverable mail.  If you’re a direct mail service provider and you’re working with a new mailer, always run through possible deliverability rates for certain types of mailing lists with your client.  Be sure you explain the potential for error on accuracy.  If you’re a new mailer yourself, talk with your mail service provider or mailing list broker about these expectations so that you’re comfortable with the reality of mail piece returns.  This will save you or your client a great deal of headache before it’s too late.

You should also have a clear understanding of realistic response rates and/or return on investment.  If you or your client has never used direct mail as a way to bring in new business, talk to your mail service provider or mailing list broker before you invest in this advertising medium.  Go through the process of determining your return on investment break-even point so that you can truly understand the risks involved and the realistic response you should expect.  Compare this potential return on investment risk with the other advertisement mediums you’re currently investing in or considering.  Likewise, measure the performance of any advertising investment so that you can learn where your investment dollars are best spent.

4.  Closely match your acquisition list with your current best customers

There are those “ideal” customers who purchase on site, pay on time, and return for more.  There are others who are loyal to your competitors and indifferent to your offer regardless of the price, value, or competitive edge.  How do these two groups of people differ?  Can you describe the “ideal” audience in terms of a mailing list in hopes of finding more just like them?  Does your current “targeted mailing list” identify the first group over the second?  Doing so is crucial to successful response rates.  Consider investing in some mailing list analytics to allow a statistician determine these minute differences that may mean big differences in return.

With an acquisition mailing, the better you’ve thought through what your current best customers “look like”, the more apt you are to finding more.  It’s always far more cost effective to pay a little more in the way of additional mailing list filters, than to mail to a larger, less responsive audience.

5.  Mailing List Update Schedule

When is your direct mail drop?  Is it shortly after the next mailing list update?  If it can wait, order the list extraction to take place after this date to ensure your highest deliverability.  Depending on the database you’re renting, the list may be passed against the NCOA every 60 to 90 days, or for some managed properties, only once a year.  Knowing the schedule of this process, and the frequency will tell you what you should expect in terms of deliverability.  If the file hasn’t been NCOA’d in the last 60 days, you may want to consider paying to have the process completed with your acquisition file.  Should your plan include mailing both your internal database and an acquisition list, it never hurts to NCOA update both files.  Talk to your list broker about the update of the list you’re about to order, as well as what goes into this process.  Ask for details on combining an NCOA and DSF2 pass on the data before you mail, chances are high you will benefit from this hygiene process.

6.  Consider reviewing the usage report on any managed files

Most every managed database has been tested by other mailers.  When selecting from a variety of potential files, ask to review the “usage report” before making your selection.  You may find that some of the files have been tested by similar “competitive” mailers but have not mailed to this file again.  “Continuation” means that the company performing the mail campaign was satisfied with the test mailing and decided to mail again to the same file.  No “continuation” means that the test was likely unsatisfactory.

Keep in mind that newer files may have little or no usage.  “Little or no usage” isn’t an indication of how well the database will perform for your campaign.  It may simply mean that few have tested the database.  It could also indicate that the manager hasn’t recorded the usage yet and therefore is unable to report.  It is not likely that you will find a usage report for mailing lists that are not managed properties.

To learn more about how to maximize your direct mail return on investment, visit http://www.bbdirect.com or call us at (866) 501-6273.

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Buying a Mailing List

January 8th, 2009

When embarking on your first direct mail campaign, it’s imperative that you think through all facets of the campaign.  From creative, to offer, to keeping your message congruent with the other advertising mediums.  Below are some of the more important points to remember when creating a mailing list.  Do it right the first time may mean the difference between a positive ROI or never testing direct mail again.

Here are seven very important points to remember:

1.  Know your customer
The absolute best way to understand your best prospects is to understand your current best customers.  You as a business owner can describe in detail what your customer looks like based on his or her attributes and need for your product or service.  But the key here is to be able to describe your customer in terms that are relevant to a mailing list broker.  If a mailing list broker is unable to build a criteria set that describes your best customer, then no matter how well you’ll be able to describe this person, you won’t be able to find more just like it.  As an example, let’s say you’re in the business of selling high-end office furniture.  You may describe your best customer as one who desires to have the most cutting edge modern attractive desk-system on the market.  Your customer may buy your office furniture products because they want to impress their clientele.  Your office furniture is a direct reflection of what your customers want their clientele to think of them…modern, classy, cutting edge.  Though this is a very clear description of what why your clients might buy your products over the competitor, the description is better suited for the direct mail marketers’ creative team that will assemble a congruent message and offer to your direct mail prospects.  A better description would sound something more that this.  “My customers are businesses such as law offices, CPA’s, Real Estate investment trusts, and a personal banker whose business employee’s greater than 50 employees’.  These customers businesses that are both new and established, but the decision maker is usually the owner located at the headquarter location.”  Notice the identifiers that describe this business clientele are consistent with the filters available from a business mailing lists database.

2.  Provide your mailing list broker with an accurate description of your product or offer.
The broker may have suggestions as to the type of list that would best suite your needs.  Most mailing list brokers can offer suggestions based on the available selects of the databases they typically use.  If you’re unsure of the filters (selects) available on a particular database, your mailing list broker should be able to offer you a data card that describes in detail these selects as well as the pricing for these selects.  In summary, a well informed list broker has a greater chance of helping his direct mail marketer.

3.  Know the difference is a response and a compiled mailing list.
-Response mailing lists are comprised of individuals who have responded to an offer either through the mail, phone, and television or through other means of mass communication.
-Compiled mailing lists are a compilation of information from public records and sources such as the phone book, courthouse records, bankruptcy filings, mortgage deed records and more.
The more you understand the differences with the various available mailing lists, the better you’ll be able to use them to your advantage.  The primary reason for understanding the difference between these two mailing lists is because the compiled mailing list will naturally contain more records per a given geography.  Should your market territory be finite, the available compiled mailing list data will be larger in number than the response file type mailing lists.  Likewise, if your market territory has no boundaries, your ideal mailing list is one in which those individuals have already responded favorably to an interest or offer such as yours.  Though the mailing list data usually costs more, response files are typically considered more responsive.

4.  Database analysis
The more you know about your internal mailing list of customers, the better you’ll be able to communicate to them.  A database analysis is a process where by you provide your customer names and addresses be evaluated.  The process is completely automated and relatively secure.  What is done is your internal customer mailing list is passed against a large universe mailing list.  This universe mailing list contains all the deliverable addresses within the U.S.  This mailing list database contains not only the name and the address, but also any demographic and psychographic information available on the records.  Wherever there is a match of the two mailing list databases, all the relative elements of information is temporary appended to your database.  The processor then looks for patterns within the appended data for what kinds of mailing list conclusions can be made.  This profile “snap-shot” is then compared with the “profile” of the resident consumers within the same market territory of your mailing list.  Ultimately, we are looking for a comparison of what your customers “look like” relative to the people in the same relative area that are not your customers.  We are also looking for how your customers “look differently” from the surrounding population.  The more we can tell about your customers the better.  Ultimately, we want to find other people within the area that are not customers but look identical to them.  The theory is that if we were to mail to those people who look most similar to your existing customers, the better changes are that they will become customers themselves.

5.  Mail piece versioning
Understand your customers’ needs and desires and speak to them in a manner that is specific or special them.  Not all people are the same.  Imagine walking to your own mail box tomorrow afternoon.  You reach in and find a postcard inviting you to a new restaurant in your area.  We’ve all received these types of postcards with some that appeal to us more than others.  What would this post include that would truly grab your attention?  The answer to this question is most likely different for you than it is for your neighbor.  For a young family, the piece might include a picture of a happy family enjoying a dinner out together.  The copy highlights the importance of getting the family out together and how this new restaurant caters to family dinning.  For a middle aged successful single female professional, the same mail piece may be a turn-off and would be quickly tossed in the trash.  But should the postcard include a photo of a group of other like aged singles enjoying dinner together with an emphasis on entrée’s that peak the interest of the most sophisticated palate, this mail piece might entice the single female to the very same restaurant as the young family.
With today’s variable print technology, each mail piece can be different in accordance to the recipient of the piece itself.  The customization can be as different as the graphic designer is willing to make it.  And generally speaking, the more your mail piece is versioned to the targeted audience, the better your direct mail response will be.  The ideal mailing list for such variable print mailings a “segmentation” type mailing list.  Segmentation mailing lists classify people into naturally occurring subsets of the population.  A restaurant’s market territory might include a 10 mile radius and within this territory, there might be 12 primary segments of the population.  Mailing the same general mail piece and offer to all 12 segments is less effective than mailing 12 versions of the same mail piece.

6.  Testimonials
A growing business can never have too many raving fans and a mail piece can always benefit with testimonials.  At the risk of cluttering a direct mail piece, relevant testimonials help a business establish trust, especially if the one providing the testimonial is a well known celebrity or a well branded business.

7.  Response measurement
It cannot be stressed enough to design a response measurement mechanism in your direct mail campaign.  Without measuring how many responders or orders have been achieved as a direct result from your direct mail investment, you will never know how effective this investment is as it compares to other advertisement mediums.  Direct mail measurement can be measured several different ways, i.e., responders, buyers, foot-traffic into the store location, actual gross revenue directly attributed to the campaign, gross profit directly attributed to the campaign, and the potential lifetime value of the responders/buyers/donors of a campaign.  Whatever the method of measurement, quantifying your response will help both in justifying a second test campaign to ultimately investing more or less into direct mail marketing.

To learn more about how to maximize your direct mail return on investment, visit http://www.bbdirect.com or call us at (866) 501-6273.  If it’s mortgage related, you may also want to visit www.triggerleadsdirect.com or www.armresetleads.com.

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Dow Jones Down/Direct Mail Up

December 12th, 2008

I’ve been getting asked daily about how the direct mail industry is doing, what’s working, what’s not working, and how this economy is affecting which industries more or less.  Though, on average, BB Direct is about 30% busier today (mid December 2008) than we were one year ago, there are some mail service providers who’ve slowed down considerably.  I believe this is partly because we haven’t put our eggs into one basket, but instead, we’ve aligned ourselves with clients who intelligently market to those segments of the business community that do well no matter how our economy is doing.  Yes, we’ve seen an evaporation of mortgage lender mailing opportunities and a big drop in the auto dealership marketing as of late.  But we’ve also experienced businesses which focus on the fix-income market do more mailing today than they’ve ever done before.

I would ask that anyone willing to share their good, their bad, and their ugly to please do so.  Please comment on what you’re business has been doing.  We are looking for mailers of any kind to share with us what you see in this market, what you forecast for 2009, and what changes you’ve been making to prepare for this difficult time.  What businesses are seeing a dip/drop in response?  Which mailers have disappeared?  And which mailers are going steady or excelling as a direct result of the recession we are experiencing?

Any information you can provide would be helpful.  In the mean time, I’ll be updating this blog with information about what I hear from our mail service provider clients.  I’ll keep be asking these questions of everyone, whether they are buying more or less mailing list data from BB Direct.  If there’s anything that we might all learn together, it will come from you.  So please submit your comment and let us know what you’ve been experiencing.

And as always, thank you in advance!

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Direct Mail 2009 Forecast

December 10th, 2008

Seems there’s a lot of finger pointing going on with who’s responsible for the mess on Wall Street and Main Street.  Yesterday I watched on CNN how the over site committee interrogated previous CEO’s of both Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae.  Given only 5 minutes per chairperson, there was little these gentlemen were able to accomplish other than ask sound bite questions and get sound bite answers.  Not to mention that these former CEO’s are frankly pretty sharp men.  With salaries in excess of $4 million per year, there’s little room for the duller, less fortunate….like some of those doing the interrogating.  Ultimately, the committee members resulted to asking them what must be done.  And in 5 minute sound bites, these former CEO’s each made their suggestions, all of which sounded frankly terrific.  So what exactly do these hearings accomplish anyway?  For me, it was little more than entertainment on a Tuesday evening.

I’ve yet to get a grasp of how bad this economic recession really is and I don’t expect anyone has a firm understanding of how long it will take to recover.  I poll clients daily on who their business is doing and get optimism from but not all.  It appears to me that currently, there are some Direct Mail related businesses more affected than others.  I talked with a marketing firm owner on Friday who said they had put all their focus on the mortgage industry and lost over 85% of their clients in the span of 3 months.  Others who’ve focused on the auto industry have simply disappeared off the face of the earth.  It’s a tragedy to hear these stories and to imagine this could happen to any of us is frightening.

I also hear stories of some guys gearing up for 2009.  They’ve secured contracts for great projects that will result in their highest revenue’s ever.  How is this possible?  The answer I believe is that while some rant on about how bad the economy has smacked them down, others are focusing on new business in area’s that haven’t been affected.  I guess I’m saying that we must strive to stay focused, strive to stay positive, and work to accomplish long-term objectives.  Like our own personal attitude, our businesses are just as nimble as we ourselves can be.  There are business opportunities all around us and there will be business opportunities out there in the future.  And they will remain out there until someone (possibly we) goes out there and pull them in.

Whether  you’re a mailing list provider or a printer, a direct agency or newspaper, or a business using direct mail marketing as a way to grow your business……think positive.  Like life, there’s no such thing as constant growth.  Ask not for a better economy, but ask for more skills to combat the recessionary years.

You can learn more by visiting direct mail in a down economy.

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Mailing List data Hygiene

December 10th, 2008

Direct mail marketing businesses rely on accurate sales leads to grow their business.  Without accurate mailing list data, many businesses miss out on lost opportunity.  Overtime, the best mailing list can become stale.  People relocate and mailing list records change.  That is why it’s so vitally important to keep your mailing list updated and current, track these changes, and avoid missed opportunity.

Mailing list data hygiene processes all you to keep your internal customer mailing list clean and healthy.  Like visiting your doctor for a regular check-up instead of just when problems occur, keeping your mailing list clean avoid potential problems from ever occurring.

This also holds true with regard to telemarketing record data.  As people relocate, their telephone number changes along with their mailing address.  If you have mailing list that’s clean and up-to-date, appending accurate phone information to this mailing list will allow you to stay in contact with the people you intend to stay in contact with.  Likewise, when an individual relocates and changes phone number, their old phone number goes back into the pool of available phone numbers and is reassigned to a completely different person.  To the unsuspecting direct mail marketer, when perform a direct mail campaign with a follow-up telemarketing campaign, they may see a higher and higher degree of inaccurate phone accuracy rate over time.

So the importance of keeping both your mailing list and telemarketing list updated and current cannot be stressed enough.  Not only will you cut cost by not spending on printing and postage to direct mail to non-existent people, but the loss of potential business opportunity increases over time because those people who’ve relocated will simply never receive your offer and thus, never respond.

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Mailing List Address Accuracy

December 10th, 2008

Customers new to the direct mailing industry may not understand common issues that occur in mailing list compilation and the direct mail delivery process. Following are some common questions and explanations.

It is important to note that mailing list accuracy is only one aspect of deliverability. Production processes and creative execution also impact mailing list deliverability rates.

What deliverability rate should I expect with my direct mail campaign? What is an acceptable direct mail deliverability rate?

The industry average typically quoted is 90%. Reasons for delivery errors are primarily due to the issues addressed below.

Why are there deceased individuals on my mailing list?

The main source for the Deceased Suppression file is the Social Security Administration (SSA). Vendors receive quarterly updates of the file and suppress deceased names as part of each compilation process. If an individual did not collect social security benefits through the SSA, they are not included on this deceased file. Most mailing list vendors consider individuals with no activity for 48 months “deceased” and remove them from their mailing list.

Why are single households receiving multiple mail pieces?

To avoid this, dedupe the mailing list on the address level not the household level. In vendor compilation procedures, a “duplicate” is defined as an individual containing the same name at the same address. Different surnames at the same address are NOT considered duplicates.  As an example, two individuals with different last names living at the same address are considered two separate households.

Why are there inaccurate addresses and/or names that do not match addresses on my mailing list?

Part of the vendor mailing list compilation process utilizes the United States Postal Service (USPS). Every month the USPS provides vendors with a Locatable Address Coding System (LACS) file. Most mailing list inaccuracies are the result of a local postmaster providing incomplete or inaccurate mailing list information. When vendors match against the LACS file there must be an EXACT name and address match. If postmasters submit a variation, this will lead to a non-match and a non-conversion of that address.

How are Change of Addresses (COA) filed?

When a person completes an NCOA (National Change of Address) request with the post office, they may file either as an “individual” or as a “household”. If a “household” move is marked, any same surnames in the household will be moved to the new address.

Why is age mailing list data sometimes listed as “estimated”?

A high percentage of vendor files are coded with exact age obtained from date of birth data. When “date of birth” does not exist, vendors apply various data points to “estimate” age. In most cases, the “estimated age” will fall within five years of the exact age. “Estimated” age data is not inaccurate. It is a reliable and accepted industry practice.

Why are there inaccuracies in income data?

In general, most “estimated household income” mailing list data is very accurate. Vendors use various methods to estimate or infer income; real estate, martial status, age, presence of children, sale price of home, summarized credit statistics, census demos, etc. When available, actual income data at the individual and household level may be used to validate “estimated income”. Errors are generally isolated and using estimated income when building your mailing list criteria mostly accurate.

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Good Business During a Recession

December 10th, 2008

While most industries are tightening their advertising budget during an economic downturn, some business segments prosper and even excel during these times by using direct mail.  While most businesses are bringing in less revenue and tightening their budget, some business industries are earning record profits to recessionary periods.  Marketing and related services like Direct Agencies, Specialized Marketing Firms, Direct Mail Printers, Direct Mail Letter-shops, Mailing List Brokers, and Newspapers can all benefit by focusing on these vertical business segments during recessionary times.  The more direct mail marketers understand these markets, their needs, and the appropriate mailing list audiences to be used, the better they will exceed through the economic cycle.

This site highlights those business segments which sensibly do well in a down market.  If you’re in the direct mail marketing business helping businesses advertise their products and services via direct mail, consider versioning your core service message to speak to these industries.

Most companies attempt to be all things to all people, but by augmenting your website, print collateral, and direct mail marketing promotions, in a way that speaks directly to particular business vertical, you’ll get more positive attention and increase your sales leads.

The industries you will want to consider your most focus and attention on are; budget travel, business to business, gambling casino’s, products and services that offer “peace of mind”, businesses that focus on the budget conscience buyer, real estate investors, mortgage refinance, staple (can’t do without products and services), businesses that export American goods and services, the ultra affluent, and alternatives to upgrading.

In upcoming posts, you’ll find detailed insights into all of these industries, how and why they work well in a down market, and the types of mailing lists available for each of these campaign categories.

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Industries that Thrive Using Direct Mail in a Down Market

December 10th, 2008

Below are the categories and industries that, in effect, weather better than businesses in other industries.  These industry types are not all weather proof but more weather resistant than others.  The categories below give you a feel for the logical reasoning of how businesses are affected by our ever changing economy.

Upgrades Can Wait

Products and Services
*  Auto Parts stores
* Uses car dealerships
* Auto repair service
*  Do-it-yourself home improvement

Considerations
Why buy new when you can repair or trade for used and save thousands.  With the current home values so low, it’s virtually impossible to sell without bring cash to closing.  Homeowners stay put if they can, make repairs if they are need, and remodel to breath new life into their aging home.

Consider a homeowners mailing list and filter those homeowners with home equity.  This is easily done by looking at length of residence as one of your filters.  Also consider a New Homeowners mailing list.  New Homeowners typically get busy with repair jobs and need products for those home repair projects.

Budget Pinch

Products and Services
* Discounted Product providers such as Wal-Mart and Dollar Store
* Furniture Liquidators
* Non-branded household necessities such as Publix brand vs. the more expensive brand
* Consignment stores

Considerations
It’s time to cut the credit cards and attempt to save what little money might be going around.  Painful but necessary, those who can do without, do without. Clipping coupons, and shopping more wisely in the party line in a down market.

Direct mail marketers should consider targeting a variety of demographics that suit the furniture offers in the store.  Most consumer mailing lists will include income, age, homeowner, marital status, child present, and age of child.  These mailing list selects will help to pinpoint the direct mail audience as well as allow you to version your message more appropriately.  With furniture liquidation sales, it’s better to expand your geographic radius to find the ideal shopper than it is to waste money attempting to convince the more local residence that will simply not part for new furniture.

Budget Travel

Considerations
Businesses decisions are generally black and white.  For the most part, businesses will do whatever they can legally do to stay afloat.  If they have to spend their last dime on advertisement, they simply must do it.  With wages needing to be paid, cash-flow must come in or the business simply closes.  And cutting expenses where they can is also a decision of economics.  Most all businesses need office equipment but if they can save a few bucks in hard times, they’ll look to buy used.  They can also use the help of a lease negotiator to help them renegotiate their existing lease or relocate to a more favorable arrangement.  They business mailing lists this market is pretty straight forward, you’ll can filter by SIC code that helps identify the type of businesses you want to direct mail to.  The business mailing list can also be filtered by sales volume, employee size, or reach only mom and pop type businesses.  The business mailing list can include the contact name of the primary decision maker at that mailing address location and a phone number for a follow up call.

Entertainment

As you can imagine, entertainment is one of the first expenses to be cut in a down market.  Consumers throughout the US begin tightening their belts, staying indoors, and enjoying activities that last longer, cost less or nothing at all.  Many families look will rent movies from Blockbuster than go the theater, they’ll make pizza at home rather than go out to the restaurant, and they’ll work to shift any money they can to paying the bills and staying afloat.  There are some times of entertainment that do continue to prosper.  Below are those considered recession-resistant.

Products and Services
* Gambling
* Bowling
* Soft-ball leagues and the like

Considerations
Call it habit forming but the gaming industry performs relatively well compared to other businesses in entertainment industry.  Direct mail marketers should consider self-reported survey driven data that identifies various types of gambles.  Casino resorts can also use their internal customer mailing list to profile.  Profiling their customer mailing list allows the direct mail marketer to better understand what their existing customers look like, and to also find new “like” customers.  Direct mail piece versioning is very useful with casino resorts as they typically offer so much more than just slot machines and table gaming.  Direct mail marketers should consider mailing lists that identify travelers who might fit the profile of other products and services the resort offers…..to then lure them into the casino floor.
Bowling and softball are an example of inexpensive outdoor activities that many participate during hard times.  They are the type of business that continues on whether the economy is booming or busting.

Peace of Mind

During recessionary times, many people are desperate and some take risks to make ends meet.  During these times, a few people buy hand guns, suffer from road rage, drink more, and pick-up drug habits.  The rest of us worry about these dangerous few, install home security, add pad-locks, and keep a watchful eye on the neighbors.  Peace of mind is a rare commodity, but if it can be bought, there are more buyers during recessionary times.

Products and Services
* Home security services
* Pawnshops

Considerations
There seems to be a direct correlation with recession and crime.  When the market goes down, the crime rate goes up.  Home security service providers like ADT see spikes in new business in neighborhoods with reported burglaries.

Consider building a mailing list of homeowners in your market territory that fit the income potential required for this service.  Also consider targeting single women, single mothers, young families, and the elderly.  Version your message appropriately for each of these target groups to increase your response rates.

Real Estate and Mortgage Choices

Products and Services
* Credit repair companies

Considerations
Though the current lending industry is a mess, for those who’ve maintained good credit, credit options are available and usually needed.  The rates are expected to continue to decline leading to ideal refinance options for those who qualify.  Direct mail is a great way to reach this audience because the property mortgage mailing list pinpoints the ideal audience so carefully.  Whether you want to help someone refinance their mortgage or buy investment homes, there’s a mailing list available for you.  Looking to help people repair their credit?  Using direct mail reaches these people because it’s a private matter and direct mail satisfies the sensitivity issue. Talk with your mailing list broker about some of the mailing lists available for this audience.

The Dollar vs. the Euro

Products and Services
* American made goods and services sold
* Stateside travel destination catering to Canada and Europe

Considerations
When the value of the U.S. dollar goes down, the value of other county currency goes up.  This does two things to the buying power of our U.S. dollar.  First, it makes the cost of imports to America go up, and second it makes the cost of American goods sold overseas go down.  So your businesses that cater to overseas buyers, such as Disney World in Orlando looking for European travelers, make an attractive offer.  For responsive individual’s sensitive products “Made in America”, direct mail marketers should consider mailing to a mailing list of Republican voters who are generally more aware of and troubled by those products manufactured overseas.  International mailing lists are also available to reach vacation travelers that may want to take advantage of a more cost effective American destination.

Ultra-Affluent Direct Mail Marketing

Considerations
For most consumers, disposable income disappears in a recession.  But for the ultra-affluent, a recession is a great time to get out of and spend some of that extra money.  Chances are their disposable income buys them more than it ever did.  For the ultra-rich, an economic down turn doesn’t affect their ability to live the best life money can buy.

Consider targeting the ultra-affluent by using direct mail to reach this incredibly wealthy audience.  Available to the direct mail marketer is a mailing list of millionaires, multi-millionaires, and billionaires.  This mailing list is very niche but consider that they’re used to being wined and dined at every turn so to grab their attention, your direct mail piece must be extremely high end.  To truly reach those who truly enjoy the best life money can buy; your direct mail piece must be more like a media kit than a post card.  This audience doesn’t respond to savings but is ever searching for the ultimate new sensation that they’ve not experienced before.

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Ethnic Direct Mail Marketing

December 10th, 2008

According to the USPS, 72% of Hispanics receive almost all of their direct mail in English. But 36% would prefer to receive their direct mail in Spanish. These percentages are pretty telling when you think of how much direct mail campaign costs are wasted. The direct mail marketer can now expect to increase their response rates by utilizing mailing list data designed to separate ethnic surname from language spoken in the household. Combining a better, more sophisticated, mailing list with proper direct mail piece copy will enhance the mail moment and attract more attention from its recipient, thus producing more and better sales leads.

The Mailing List

But not all mailing lists targeting ethnicity are the same. Some mailing list sources attempt to predict the ethnicity of a home or its primary language solely on the spelling of the last name. Today’s technology allows you to build a mailing list that’s multi-dimensional in creation. In addition to using the spelling the last name when compiling an ethnic mailing list, with over 75,000 first names common to more than one ethnicity and another 75,000 first names unique to a given ethnicity, both first and last names can be used in building an ethnic mailing list.

Ethnic groups can then be created for proper ethnic identification. Creating these ethnic groups goes a long way to targeting and versioning your direct mail message for greater impact response.

Ethnic Group Creation

Some ethnic groups are more easily identifiable than others, but simple techniques help cure the ethnic group identification process. For instance, many approaches offer Asian categories such as Chinese, Japanese, Korean, and Vietnamese.  But how can these offerings assure you that names that properly belong in other ethnic groups are not mixed in with the major groups they do offer?  An example of this might well be Myanmar (Burmese) mixed in with Chinese.  Names such as Ma Ne Tun, Ba Thaung, or Maung Khaing are Burmese names, not Chinese.  They do not speak or think in Chinese, and are probably not receptive to offerings geared specifically to Chinese people.  For names that are common to 2 or more ethnic groups the method we use is to look at the middle names to be used as a tie breaker.  An example of this would be Peter Yu, he could be either Korean or Chinese and there the middle name comes into play.  Peter Mei Yu would be coded as Chinese and Peter Hak Yu as Korean.  John Smith could be English or African American depending on geographic location but John Big Eagle Smith, from his middle name would be coded as Native American regardless of his geographic location.  Middle names are also used to define different religions within a group, for example Sikh or Hindu.  Other examples include “Russian”, where competitive approaches seem to have lumped all “Soviets” together under that term, “Yugoslavian”, where one might well find Croats Serbs, Slovenes, and a number of other ethnicities, “Czechoslovakian” where Czechs, Slovaks, and a smattering of Magyar, Polish, Estonian, and other groups might be found, and most specifically, “African American”, a specialty deserving its own explanation as an advantage. By incorporating name research and geographic locators we can determine Hispanic Country of Origin from twenty-one countries: Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Columbia, Costa Rica, Cuba, the Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Puerto Rico, Spain, Uruguay and Venezuela. This incorporation of both name research and geographic locators go along way to helping create an accurate ethnic mailing list.

The Direct Mail Piece and Message

The direct mail marketer should consider a number of inclusions to their direct mail piece that will help in the development of your internal customer/prospect mailing list.

*  Bi-lingual language is very important for the first direct mail piece to your acquisition mailing list. Though you are using the best known ethnic mailing list available that’s targeting by ethnic back-ground, you’ll not want to assume that all direct mail recipients can speak and read their native tongue. By providing both English and their native language, say Spanish, the direct mail recipient will not only appreciate the effort made to respectfully communicate to them, but you’re also assured you’re not missing out of those who wouldn’t understand your offer.

* This first direct mail piece should of course have a response vehicle with in it. The response vehicle could be a phone number to return call to set an appointment, or maybe a Business Reply by Mail. If you’ve left a phone, be sure the direct mail responder has two options on the phone that are measurable. At the very least, two phone numbers; one for English, and one in their native tongue. This again respectfully accommodates their potential need and allows you to track the language preference.

*       Going forward, you should have developed an internal prospect/customer mailing list with essentially to clusters within it. One of the clusters within your mailing list would be those who’s preference is, say, Spanish, and the other would be those preference is English. All future correspondence with this prospect/customer should be in the language of their choice.

As your internal customer mailing list becomes sizable enough, you should consider splintering your entire direct mail marketing efforts to version not only the language on your direct mail campaigns, but also any special interests of this audience. Your direct mail newsletter might not only be provided in two language versions, but the native language one should also include subject matter that’s conducive to the interest of that ethnicity.

It’s important to ask what your various ethnic clusters might want to see from you as a business. At each direct mail communication thread, be sure to include questions that will heighten your awareness of the ethnic cluster and compare the responses with those of the English cluster. Look for responses that differ most between the two languages and work to develop changes within your organization that better address the needs of different people. You may not see much difference between these two cluster groupings but it’s important to continually ask questions of everyone on your internal customer mailing list to stay abreast of your customers ever changing needs.

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